PushthePile

If I'm running the Bills from here foward, I'm bringing in any QB I think can compete. With that being said, I'm not convinced that Vick can do that as a traditional QB. What he can do is become a playmaker. This team could use Vick alot more than the Eagles can and I think he'd be more valuable here. We need to start thinking about mixing in wildcat formations and getting away from a traditional offense. A dropback pro-style offense should be the goal but we don't have the pieces right now. We can mask this much like the Dolphins do. Fred Jackson, Marshawn Lynch, and Michael Vick could be the centerpieces of this attack. I wouldn't stop my pursuit of a dropback passer though. Considering that this team needs half a dozen playmakers and half a dozen solid players, I'm not spending a first rounder on a QB. It's the highest bust rate of all positions and I'm not sold on any of the prospects. You can grab a Tony Pike type player without risking all the cap space. A rookie or two along with TE and another mid-range vet would be an ideal situation for competition. If Michael Vick isn't intersted in running a specialized offense, than I'm not interested in him. He can be the starter but the majority of this attack would be a form of the wildcat. Again, I don't believe the wildcat is ideal in the long run but we can't block from the tackle position and our QBs have proven they can't get it done. It would buy this team time and allow us to be competitive!

Trent Edwards has done virtually nothing to help this o-line out. I'm not sure what games your watching but captain checkdown is looking RB even when the protection is good. It's Edwards inability to get the ball anywhere down field that has held this offense back the most. Edwards has managed to get sacked 19 times in 6 games, while Fitzpatrick has been sacked 4 times in 3 games. Imagine what would have happened if Edwards hadn't mastered the one yard desperation checkdown!

The Packers o-line is every bit as bad as the Skins'.

London Fletcher is in his 12th season of professional football. He only started one game his rookie season but since then has started all but one game over 11 years. It's amazing how the guys getting paid to run football teams have missed the boat so badly, and a few of our very own TSW experts can see he sucks. I mean, with 12 years of game footage you would think that someone would have noticed that London only tackles players 10 yards down field. London Fletcher has had a fantastic career and is as reliable as they come. He's always been a leader and class act. Screw the pro-bowl, it is nothing but a joke anyway. Fletcher played his azz off for this team and it's a little disturbing that a small percentage of fans still hold onto that BS myth. What we have now at MLB, should serve as sufficient proof as to what Fletcher brings to a team.

NFL players have been working with top-shelf strength coaches since high-school. Division 1 programs for the most part employ coaching staffs and training support systems that compare or exceed what the pros have. Scientific strength journals? Sure science is constantly evolving, as is training techniques but the average NFL player knows how to train. The athlete knows infintely more about his body than the teams strength coach. Anyone who has ever trained before will tell you that every person is different. The goal is to find what works for the individual. It's not like the strength coach reads over his journal and runs the team through a series of exercises. Each player represents a business. Most players hire their own trainers and personal coaches, to protect that business. When it comes down to it, millions of dollars are on the line. You can bet your azz that the players are aware of what needs to be done and they know how to get their own body ready. Injuries happen for alot of different reasons. The Bills aren't doing anything drastically different than the rest of the NFL. They aren't suffering an alarming amount of injuries in comparison to the average, either. The problem becomes ever so glaring, when you don't have anything that resembles adequate backups.

Agreed. At this point of the game, pro football players know as much about conditioning as their strength coachs. Strength coachs are rah rah guys, who offer tips and motivation. They also assist with rehabilitation for already injured players. It's not the coaching staff's fault guys get hurt. This team has had some injury plagued seasons over the years but so does every team from time to time. The main difference is that the Bills never have quality depth. Injuries are inevitable and you can't have practice squad players waiting in the wings.

When a player misses 49 games in six years, it's time to really start examining whether or not he's worth it. Don't get me wrong, Bob Sanders is a gamechanger and an elite safety. He has as big of an effect on a defense as anybody. How can you rely on him, though? He has missed more than half of the games in his career. Would you rather have an elite player for half the year or an average player for most of the year? I think the average player who stays on the field is a better option. The Colts have to try and replace this guy every season and he is rarely healthy for the second half.

Thanks Darin. Fantastic story that I shared with a few people already.

....parades, places of work, busy city streets, concerts, etc. It's only a matter of time.

The drugs aren't overrated. They work and the effects are dramatic in some cases. Average to mediocre players put up some all-time seasons and great players just put up absurd numbers. The proof of their effects couldn't be more obvious. The game was rampant with them and I honestly believe it is a very clean product. The best players are the best players, in a league full of juicers or a league thats clean. A-Rod personally might have benefitted from the relief of not having this secret hanging over his head but I think he just matured overall as man. It could have quite possibley stemmed from his fallout, many people take that path. His biggest benefit was the strength of this team. They just had a real team this year. A-ROD wasn't bigger than the Yankees and he responded positively to that. The guy repeatedly talked about his acceptance from teammates after his admittance. He's a different player and different man.

Completely false. The body's natural testosterone takes a major hit when it's need is compromised by performance enhancing substance. The fallout is a system that can't produce adequate amounts of natural testosterone for awhile. Every person I've ever seen that juiced, immediately shrunk by a noticeable margin. I would imagine that the top of the line steroids have less side effects but he is certainly not benefitting from cycles years ago. Just not the case.

I don't care what the haters say either Pooj. This win feels great from a fans perspective. As a fan of the Yankees you feel like its us against the world. I'm glad to walk around feeling like the world took one on the chin last night.

Sorry Pooj I've been off topic a bit. Congrats to the Yanks on number 27!

Look I'm not trying to say Howard is a bad player. I think he's very good and young too. I believe that right now Utley is a better and more valuable player. Utley beats you in many different ways. He beats you with his glove, he beats with his bat, he beats you with his head, and he does alot of little things that don't show up in the box score. Utley moves runners over, he works counts that wear down pitchers, he can lay a bunt down if needed, he can steal a base, he can play different positions, he makes "good outs" in critical situations. Ryan Howard is a one or two trick pony at this point of his career. He is a great HR hitter but if he's cold at the plate he's invisible. Utley, Howard, Werth, and Ibanez are all good enough to protect eachother. They all benefit from eachothers talent. The Yankees were pitching around and intentionally walking Utley, to get at Howard with a lefty. I compare Ryan Howard to Dirk Nowitzki. Dirk is a phenominal scorer and won a league MVP but is not a complete player. He is great at what he does and has alot of value but he is not the best. I'd choose alot of non-mvp winners ahead of him. If I was to start a franchise i'd pick Howard. If I wanted to make a run at a world series and the season started tomorrow I'd choose Utley.

I was talking playoffs. Rob Johnson's 1 td contribution in the regular season is not comparable to Rex Grossman making the superbowl as the starter with the Bears.

I'm not advocating Rex Grossman as a good QB, so relax. I was simply stating that his career has been more of a success than Trent's to this point. Your comparison of what Rob Johnson did with the Bucs and what Rex did with Bears is hardly a comparison at all.

I think most of us know he won the 2006 MVP. He deserved it and had a fantastic season. The award traditionally goes to power hitters and he was the best of the bunch. Chase Utley is a superior baseball player to Ryan Howard and it has nothing to do with the World Series. Ryan Howard is overrated in the sense that I don't think he is as valuable to his team as many other players are to theirs.

I apologize for the misrepresentation of the stats. I was thinking of his 2008 season in terms of his low batting averages. He did hit 279 this season which is better than his previous two seasons. As far as strikeouts go? Please! I was giving you stats that didn't include 2009. Again my error I was in kind of a hurry. If you include his 186 strikeouts from this season his problem is even more apparent. He was one strikeout away from having three of his four complete seasons in the top ten. That is pitiful. My point wasn't off the mark it was just my hasty research. He is on pace to obliterate the mark. His fielding is not even close to Texieras. He has finished 19th, 18th, 24th, and 22nd in fielding percentage over his four full seasons. He has also comitted 14, 12, 19, and 14 errors, which is always amongst the highest of his position. I trust that it's a work in progress but it's not average yet. It's interesting that you mention Mark Reynolds and Adam Dunn. These two players are very similar to Ryan Howard statistically and with their approach to the game. They are power hitters who stikeout at an alarming rate as well. I think it's kind of telling that the top 7 individual strikeout seasons of all time are found in the last five years and are shared by 4 different players. It provides alot of homeruns but it's bad baseball. Pujols, Utley, Jeter, and many more are true professional hitters. Howard is guy with alot of talent but a poor approach. He could be much more than Dunn and Reynolds but right now he's not.

Ryan Howard has fantastic power and is a good run producer on a great hitting team. A player is not complete if he is so easily neutralized by lefthanded pitching. Especially when it comes to the postseason when teams are so willing to shuffle pitchers in and out. Ryan Howard has 679 strikeouts in 3 1/2 years, which averages out to 194 per season. No one else in baseball history has EVER averaged that at any point of their career. He is 25% of the way to the career record already. Strikeouts are killer to an offense. His "legendary slumps" had him batting .227 into September this year. He has never had a fielding average that surpassed the league medium. The man certainly has talent and power. He is sandwiched between to superior players, in Utley and Werth and enjoys the tremendous advantages of that. I like the guy and root for him alot. I just told someone yesterday that he is one of my favorite players but he has major holes in his game. If you just look at HRs and RBIs, he is completely dominant. The game is hardly that simple, though. Albert Pujols is by far and away the best power hitter in baseball. His career strikeouts is 570 over 9 seasons. Howard looks great in stretches but is not even close to a complete player. 2006 has been his only season of brilliance, since than he is basically Adam Dunn or Richie Sexson.

Not buying it buddy. Larry Johnson has had multiple arrests regarding women. I don't think him being punished for using the word fag has anything to do with them. http://nflcrimes.blogspot.com/ This is what is being swept under the rug. Larry Johnson saying fag is what we are talking about, though.

Rob Johnson? Did he even take a snap? Rex Grossman started every game of that postseason.

The problem I have isn't the fact that the Chiefs and the NFL are looking to punish a player for using a hateful term, it's the complete hypocrisy of when to serve punishment. The message that is being sent is that assault, violence towards women, and other heinous crimes are less offensive then ignorance and insensitive remarks. Larry Johnson like many of his peers have comitted far worse acts that have been conveniantly swept under the rug. Abuse and violence okay but using the word fag not okay.

I can understand where your coming from, I believe the truth lies somewhere in the middle. I'm sure Ward has taken his fair of cheap shots but to label him the worst is difficult given the nature of the sport. As for the Paup hit, I'm pretty sure that wouldn't fly. From memory he led with the helmet and got a little high up by the QBs head. I believe it was very debatable at the time. Let alone now.

Excellent post. I agree with all of it but especially Chris Rose. Thta guy makes for the most awkward and uncomfortable situations. As for Ryan Howard, I personally like the guy alot but he is so overrated. He seems like a really good kid too.

Given the uncertainty of picking QBs in the draft, I'd love this pick. This franchise can't afford another whiff with a high value pick.